da Doctah wrote:Aw, c'mon! In a galaxy where there are people who talk like Yoda and others who talk like Jar-Jar Binks, and nobody says boo to either of them, you're going to make a big deal about this?

But they aren't human. We don't expect those people to speak correctly...

Neither are Chewbacca and R2D2 human, and everybody converses with them as well with no apparent difficulty or misunderstanding.

Which makes you wonder why Anakin felt there was a need for a protocol droid capable of understanding over six million languages.

da Doctah wrote:Neither are Chewbacca and R2D2 human, and everybody converses with them as well with no apparent difficulty or misunderstanding.

Which makes you wonder why Anakin felt there was a need for a protocol droid capable of understanding over six million languages.

That's not really true. Only C-3PO seems to be able to understand R2-D2 unaided, and he routinely acts as interpreter for him. When Luke is in his X-Wing, he has a computer screen that translates what R2 says.

I can't readily think of any instances where anyone other than Han or C-3PO converse freely with Chewbacca, either.

Personally, I think "It was I who" sounds way better overall, and triply so if you're a menacing, all-powerful galactic overlord. "It was me who" or, even worse, "It was me that" just sounds awkward when I hear it.

flicky1991 wrote:Therefore, if you say "It is me.", then you'd logically say "Whom are you?", if you are the kind of person who says "whom".

Right?

Wrong. The intuition to use object pronouns in "It [be] {person}" sentences almost certainly has to do with the pronoun coming after a verb, not with it being the object of a verb (since after all "be" isn't transitive and so "me" isn't the object of "It was me").

It's interesting me that you take issue with the (arbitrary invented) rule that only nominative pronouns can come after "be", while simultaneously having no problem with the use of "it" to refer to oneself. Surely the most logical construction would be "I am I", no?

drazen wrote:Personally, I think "It was I who" sounds way better overall, and triply so if you're a menacing, all-powerful galactic overlord. "It was me who" or, even worse, "It was me that" just sounds awkward when I hear it.

It was me what done it.

Unless stated otherwise, I do not care whether a statement, by itself, constitutes a persuasive political argument. I care whether it's true.---If this post has math that doesn't work for you, use TeX the World for Firefox or Chrome

gmalivuk wrote:Wrong. The intuition to use object pronouns in "It [be] {person}" sentences almost certainly has to do with the pronoun coming after a verb, not with it being the object of a verb (since after all "be" isn't transitive and so "me" isn't the object of "It was me").

I'm not convinced this is correct, because...• I'm not convinced that "be" isn't transitive in English dialects that allow "it is me", "I am him", "we are them", etc.; reanalyzing "be" as an ordinary transitive verb is one way this usage of cases could have come about.• The rule isn't about being after a verb, since, at least in my dialect (which has "it is me", etc.), I'd always say "Am I right?", "Is he the one?", etc., not *"Am me right?" or *"Is me right?", *"Is him the one?"; those pronouns clearly come after verbs and get the subject form.• At least in my dialect, it seems "me", "us", "him", "her", "them" are the default forms, with subject forms only used in certain positions. "It is me" isn't because "me" is after the verb/in the object position, but rather because "me" isn't in the subject position. (I'd also use "me" in the vocative ("Me, stop doing that!"), in contrastive topics ("You like that; now, me, I don't like it"), and sentence fragments ("Who did this?" "Not me!"), as well as of course direct and indirect objects and objects of prepositions.) If I were to use who/whom like I do I/me, he/him, etc. (which is what I was taught), then yes it would be "Whom are you?".That said, I don't know what the intuition would be for someone who does use "whom" for objects; perhaps they'd treat who/whom differently from he/him, and thus say "Who are you?" but "I am him".

It's interesting me that you take issue with the (arbitrary invented) rule that only nominative pronouns can come after "be", while simultaneously having no problem with the use of "it" to refer to oneself. Surely the most logical construction would be "I am I", no?

• I'm pretty sure that he's taking issue with object pronouns after "be", not with subject pronouns after "be".• I see no connection between where subject vs. object pronouns are used and whether "it" should be used there.• The construction "it is I"/"it is me" isn't referring to the speaker as "it"; the construction is using "it" as a dummy pronoun, similar to both "it"'s in "it seems like it's raining".

chridd wrote:The construction "it is I"/"it is me" isn't referring to the speaker as "it"; the construction is using "it" as a dummy pronoun, similar to both "it"'s in "it seems like it's raining".

I thought of those as being impersonal rather than dummy pronouns, but it seems the jury is out and some linguists lump "weather it" with the dummy pronoun it in sentences like this:.

gmalivuk wrote:It's interesting me that you take issue with [the rule]

In that case (according to the Great Wiki) it's being used for extraposition, the canonical sentence being "That you take issue with the rule is interesting me", which seems grammatical to me if a bit archaic.

If we unroll the the Emperor's extraposition we get to something like:

[The person] who allowed the alliance to know the position was I

Unrolling the relative clause we have:

I allowed the alliance to know the position.

I'm pretty sure that the case of the pronoun in this sentence (the "deep structure"?) is relevant to its case in the original. Surely he would say:

chridd wrote:The rule isn't about being after a verb, since, at least in my dialect (which has "it is me", etc.), I'd always say "Am I right?", "Is he the one?", etc., not *"Am me right?" or *"Is me right?", *"Is him the one?"; those pronouns clearly come after verbs and get the subject form.

After the subject and verb, then.

At least in my dialect, it seems "me", "us", "him", "her", "them" are the default forms, with subject forms only used in certain positions. "It is me" isn't because "me" is after the verb/in the object position, but rather because "me" isn't in the subject position. (I'd also use "me" in the vocative ("Me, stop doing that!"), in contrastive topics ("You like that; now, me, I don't like it"), and sentence fragments ("Who did this?" "Not me!"), as well as of course direct and indirect objects and objects of prepositions.) If I were to use who/whom like I do I/me, he/him, etc. (which is what I was taught), then yes it would be "Whom are you?".That said, I don't know what the intuition would be for someone who does use "whom" for objects; perhaps they'd treat who/whom differently from he/him, and thus say "Who are you?" but "I am him".

Yeah, "me" as the default form is probably the more accurate rule. I don't think anyone extends that to all object pronouns though. I occasionally use "whom" but never as the base form.[/quote]

Unless stated otherwise, I do not care whether a statement, by itself, constitutes a persuasive political argument. I care whether it's true.---If this post has math that doesn't work for you, use TeX the World for Firefox or Chrome

Who has two thumbs and allowed the Alliance to know the location of the shield generator? This guy!

gmalivuk wrote:

drazen wrote:Personally, I think "It was I who" sounds way better overall, and triply so if you're a menacing, all-powerful galactic overlord. "It was me who" or, even worse, "It was me that" just sounds awkward when I hear it.

It was me what done it

So, more of a menacing, all-powerful Cockney overlord.

The story of my life in xkcdmafia:

Tigerlion wrote:Well, I imagine as the game progresses, various people will be getting moody.

BoomFrog wrote:I still have no idea what town moody really looks like.

Murderbot wrote:Is the Emperor sitting on a talking chair, like Stephen Hawking?

da Doctah wrote:Aw, c'mon! In a galaxy where there are people who talk like Yoda and others who talk like Jar-Jar Binks, and nobody says boo to either of them, you're going to make a big deal about this?

I think we should hold the Emperor of the Free World to a higher standard than a bumbling buffoon and a mystical monk.

Wait, are we still talking about StarWars or did you switch to PEOTUS?

What's PEOTUS?

aerion111 wrote:

Murderbot wrote:Is the Emperor sitting on a talking chair, like Stephen Hawking?

da Doctah wrote:Aw, c'mon! In a galaxy where there are people who talk like Yoda and others who talk like Jar-Jar Binks, and nobody says boo to either of them, you're going to make a big deal about this?

I think we should hold the Emperor of the Free World to a higher standard than a bumbling buffoon and a mystical monk.

I assume you meant that irrespective?Though I suppose there is a case to be made for calling Yoda a buffoon at times, and Jar-Jar certainly has some monk-like qualities at times.

"bumbling buffoon" came just came to mind and then I had to come up with another alliteration and forgot to put them in order.

kalira wrote:Well, GrammarNazi!Luke never met JarJar. And as far as Yoda goes, don't you think it's a little suspicious he suddenly dies right as Luke gets back to him from Cloud City when he wasn't at all ill beforehand? Clearly faked his death so as to avoid any more annoying lectures from GN!Luke regarding his way of speaking.